Trying out my homemade press

Here is the press on it's new table (made from the leftover worktop material and some pieces of wood we had left over from building the studio). I thought it'd take up a lot space but thankfully it fits nicely next to the sofa:

I had two linocuts waiting to be printed, one of a bear and one of a lemur. I finished them a few weeks ago, but rather than struggling to print them by hand I'd set them aside until the press was finished.

The first to be tried was the bear, and wow what a difference! With a lot of time and effort I could get some good results hand printing with a baren, but I would have had to use more ink to get a solid enough transfer, and inevitably adding more ink made me lose a bit of detail as I tend to carve quite shallow. The pressure the press can exert is so much that less ink is needed and the colour is more solid and defined.

The only problem so far is that the press's steel uprights are slowly pivoting off vertical under the pressure, so the top bar is moving slightly to the left. I don't think it's a major problem though - just need to think of a way of strengthening it to keep it all in line.

Here's a detail of a test bear (I tried a light blue colour but I'm not sure about it, I think I'll make it a bit darker for a better contrast):